By Ted Lord
PENRITH — In the largest rally ever here, some 4000 people marched down High Street to a rally at Penrith Stadium on a "Walk for Reconciliation" on November 1.
Supported and organised by local church and community groups, the rally aimed to inform people of the social, moral and legal injustices and discrimination that have deeply and adversely affected society. It was about recognising and apologising for the wrongs of the past and taking responsibility for the future.
Many local politicians spoke about these injustices and the need for reconciliation at the local level with the original inhabitants of the Nepean Valley, the Darug people.
The keynote speaker was Noel Pearson, from the Cape York Land Council. He told the gathering that terra nullius — the myth of an empty land — was wrong under Aboriginal law, wrong in 1788, wrong under English law and wrong under our law today.
"The Mabo case is an attempt to right the wrongs of the last 200 years", Pearson said.
Pearson spoke of compromise by both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians as equal partners. The principles of the High Court's Mabo and Wik judgments amount to three simple proposals for peace:
1. that all land titles of non-Aborigines cannot be taken away from them, though they were obtained by the dispossession of Aborigines.
2. that remaining crown land and remnant areas should be given to Aboriginal people.
3. that lands in the "middle" — pastoral leases and national parks — should be shared.
Pearson pointed out, "Reconciliation cannot be settled by one side of the table; it must be a compromise between both sides. The people of Penrith can keep their lands, but the land left over should be given to the Darug people. This is our opportunity to have peace and to settle grievances ...
"Australia has this unique opportunity to settle this with peace and dignity for both parties by recognising the decisions of the High Court."